The Aukiman Tattoo Project

The decision to get inked is a personal one, easier for some than others. Some opting for the urge to get inked on the spur of the moment after a wild night out, others deliberating over the matter and finally deciding months or even years later on what to do. Most who have tattoos will say that they got them for a specific reason such as a meaningful time in their lives or to remember someone, some will get tattoos for fashion because they feel more sexy or adventurous wearing them, others opt for tattoos simply because they love the design element and sometimes even design their own themselves.

My own opinion on the matter is that I needed to use a certain combination of caution and good judgment, when finally considering the real possibility of wearing a tattoo I spent the 10 months previous to this article taking into account where my future employment opportunities might take me, the impact this may have on opinions of those nearest and dearest to me, even as far as imagining what the skin might be like on various parts of my body in years to come. Originally I had thoughts of getting a tattoo on my neck but realised this would be too limiting in terms of employment or roles in independent film, for me at any rate.

I have finally reached my decision that concealability suits my own life choices the best and have opted for a quarter sleeve and my own tastes run to tribal patterns of sorts. Now even at this stage of planning there is still a fair way to go. I know my tattoo interests are mostly in the design and I prefer tribal theme's and pattern type tattoo's but here again are a number of paths I could take. While I have a celtic heritage and it would be good to be able to tie some meaning to that I have found a lot of the traditional celtic knot designs are a little too intricate.

One design that caught my eye over the last few months and I constantly keep referring back to is the Samoan design quarter sleeve of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. Dwayne travelled to Hawaii to fulfill the Samoan tradition of having his family history tattooed on him, the artist incorporating deep meaning of both family and tradition into the design at the same time as skillfully fitting the work on to the curves of his musculature.

This highlights another possible path I could take, the other half of my heritage is Melanesian in origin (Papua New Guinea), the tattoo designs of this area tend to be geometric motifs and abstract depictions of everyday objects which could quite easily be adapted into a design of my preference.

Testing the Final Design



Testing designs for 'The Aukiman Tattoo Project' will be an important part on finalising the design I will hopefully eventually wear permanently, it is one thing to see a two dimensional flat pattern design on paper, but when translating that design onto a body with curves and ratios I want to see for myself the effect as well as give the tattoo artist a definite guide of what I want done. A photographer supplied template is the ideal testing environment. In the example above superimposing Dwayne Johnson's Polynesian tattoo design gives me a fairly precise view of what it would look like against my frame and body curves and would also allows for the adjustment of various ratios.

We will be using this technique of course to decide on the final pattern and placement. What we are looking for now is expressions of interest from tattoo designers/artists who can work with us on "The Aukiman Tattoo Project" to completion.

Wanted Tattoo Designers/Artists

Expressions of interest? If you are interested in getting the commission plus the free publicity for this project please contact us using the form below.